I've had a related problem with Futura in NWP so I'm interested in this topic. I've defined a paragraph style as well as a character style using Futura Light and applied them to a text. When I opened the document the next time, the font had changed to Futura Medium. Deselecting and re-selecting the paragraph and character styles wouldn't change anything. In the next step I disabled all "Futura Medium" fonts in the Font Collection. As a result, in the Character palette the font was labeled red which means font substitution. (I didn't change my paragraph and character styles; in the Tooldrawer it still said Futura Light.) I had to re-define the paragraph and character styles. This time, it didn't change upon re-opening the document but in some parts of the text (headers, footers) Futura Light was now substituted by Futura Book. So I disabled all "Futura Book" fonts as well. Same story. Even now I sometimes get red labels in the Character palette even with all the (Futura Light) fonts used in the styles applied are activated. Nisus seems not to like Futura Light...
What am I doing wrong?

I was not able to observe this. When I change some text to Futura, the font face defaults to "Medium". Do you always end up with "Condensed Medium"? Also, what version of OSX are you using?

When I click on Futura Medium, it undoes the italics in my very veyr long bibliography.

When you apply italics to some text marked in the Futura font, NWP switches the font face to "Medium Italic" (or perhaps "Condensed Italic" in your case). You can see this in the Character palette. This is as it should be: one wants to use the proper italic font face.

The conflict occurs when you switch the face to "Medium". NWP completely discards the old font face, and thus your text no longer appears italic. If you want your text to appear italic, why not choose the "Medium Italic" Futura font face?

ninjagame wrote:I've defined a paragraph style as well as a character style using Futura Light and applied them to a text. When I opened the document the next time, the font had changed to Futura Medium.

The font and font face should never change if you merely reopen a document. If you can reproduce this, please let us know and send us the problem document.

As a result, in the Character palette the font was labeled red which means font substitution

You may be confused on this point. By default the red coloring means that the font was substituted because the characters it was applied to are not contained in that font. For example, the Futura font does not contain any Hebrew characters, so NWP would show the font name "Futura" in red and choose another suitable font. On the other hand, if the font is not available (eg: not installed/enabled on your computer) then the font name will by default appear in orange.

I should note that all these colors are customizable, so perhaps you changed a setting in the Appearance preferences at some point. Also, if you disable/enable fonts in Font Book, it may be best to restart NWP for the changes to take full effect. There's no guarantee that the font changes are instantaneous or complete.

You may be confused on this point. By default the red coloring means that the font was substituted because the characters it was applied to are not contained in that font. For example, the Futura font does not contain any Hebrew characters, so NWP would show the font name "Futura" in red and choose another suitable font. On the other hand, if the font is not available (eg: not installed/enabled on your computer) then the font name will by default appear in orange.

Thanks for the clarification. I hadn't noticed this difference before. In the meantime, I seem to have got rid of the problem by decativating the fonts but there may be other documents on which I worked earlier. If I get another document displaying the effect, I'll send it.

should note that all these colors are customizable, so perhaps you changed a setting in the Appearance preferences at some point.

Not as far as I know but again, thanks for the clarification. I'll look into it.

Also, if you disable/enable fonts in Font Book, it may be best to restart NWP for the changes to take full effect. There's no guarantee that the font changes are instantaneous or complete.

That could be possible in this case, too. I'll have a look. Thank you!

I just reread your response Martin, and I don't think you understand the problem: any text I choose and change to futura it is changed to the condensed futura. not a problem if all of the text is not italic. but if any is i reformat to futura and regular and lost the italics.

the problem is that somehow futura's default is condensed. If i change to palatin or times, for example, it will respect that and put everything in bold, regular, italic etc

The details of the problem are rather unexciting. Basically the order of the font face information provided by OSX changed from Tiger to Leopard, and Nisus Writer was incorrectly assuming that the first provided font face was the "regular" one. Of the fonts I have installed on my machine, only Futura appears to be affected. In any case, we'll get this fixed for the next update, thanks.